ethnic
Noun pluralethnics
Pluralethnics
- 1Having to do with a people or group defined by shared origins, whether racial, ancestral, national, religious, or cultural.
The region's many ethnic groups have coexisted peacefully for centuries.
Government forms often ask citizens to state their ethnic origin.
UsageCommon in ethnic group, ethnic minority, ethnic origin and ethnic background.
Similarracial, cultural, national
Note
Today the word often travels with racial, as in "racial and ethnic minority groups." There the two words name overlapping but distinct ways of grouping people, by race on one hand and by shared ancestry or culture on the other.
- 2Characteristic of the traditional culture of a particular people, especially a foreign or minority one, as in its food, dress, music, or art.
The restaurant specializes in ethnic cuisine rarely found elsewhere in the city.
Designers borrowed ethnic patterns for the new spring collection.
UsageSome readers find ethnic food or ethnic dress vague; naming the culture (Thai, Ethiopian) is often clearer.
Similartraditional, folk
- 3A person regarded as ethnic, especially a foreigner or a member of an immigrant community.
Politicians in the 1970s courted Polish, Irish, and Italian ethnics in the factory towns of the Midwest.
She resented being labeled an ethnic in her own hometown.
UsageName the group instead, such as Polish Americans or people of Italian descent.
Oppositenative
Less common meanings
- 4Heathen; not belonging to the Jewish, Christian, or Muslim religions.
Similarpagan, heathen, gentile
Note
A label for describing the religious past rather than the present. It keeps the meaning of the Latin ethnicus, "pagan," that lies behind the modern group sense. A modern reader will hear "ethnic rites" as cultural rather than religious.
Checked 2 Nov 2026 · 1 fact
- The religious sense preserves the meaning pagan of Latin ethnicus, the source of the modern English word. en.wiktionary.org
- 5A person who is not Jewish, Christian, or Muslim; a heathen or pagan.
Note
The noun had real bite in seventeenth-century religious controversy. John Milton's Of Reformation in England (1641) sets "impure ethnics" beside "lay dogs" as contemptuous names. The translators' preface to the 1611 King James Bible calls a pagan Roman consul and his wife Ethnicks.
Checked 2 Nov 2026 · 5 facts
- Milton's work belongs to seventeenth-century religious controversy. christs.cam.ac.uk
- John Milton wrote Of Reformation, first published in 1641. bpsc.library.ualberta.ca
- Milton places impure ethnics beside lay dogs as contemptuous descriptions. oll-resources.s3.us-east-2.amazonaws.com
- The King James Bible containing the translators' preface was first published in 1611. en.wiktionary.org
- The translators' preface calls the consul of Rome and his wife Ethnicks, meaning pagans. ebible.org
- 6A demonym for an Ancient Greek city: the name given to its inhabitants.
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Practice
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Origin
Ancient Greek éthnos first meant "a company" and later "a people or nation." From it came ethnikós, meaning "heathen" or "of or for a nation," which Latin took as ethnicus ("pagan, heathen"). English got the word through Middle English ethnik.